Mark Carney: the ‘rock star central banker’ weighing up run to be Canada’s PM
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Former Bank of England governor in the frame as successor to departing Justin Trudeau. Mark Carney, who has said he is considering a run to replace Justin Trudeau as the Canadian premier, spent seven years in the UK as the Bank of England governor. Carney was headhunted in 2013 by the then chancellor, George Osborne, after serving as the governor of the Bank of Canada, and was known at the time by the unlikely epithet of “rock star central banker”.
![[Mark Carney, the then governor of the Bank of England, walks to a monetary policy committee briefing on his first day inside the central bank’s headquarters in London in 2013]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/c2625949518997841f32d799c8ca4a9daffa8dd8/34_229_3427_2058/master/3427.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
He remains an influential figure on the global economic stage, and Rachel Reeves hailed his endorsement at the 2023 Labour conference – given by video message – as the party sought to present itself as economically credible. Carney called Reeves a “serious economist” who “understands the economics of work, of place and family”.
Carney arrived in London determined to bring change to the stuffy Bank. He introduced plastic banknotes, and a new approach to communication known as “forward guidance”, which was meant to give investors a clearer idea of which way interest rates were heading.
The former innovation proved more immediately successful than the latter. After the Bank was seen as sending out mixed signals on rates, Carney was memorably accused of being an “unreliable boyfriend” by the Labour MP Pat McFadden – then a member of the Treasury select committee, now a powerful Cabinet Office minister.
